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Jerome Bettis will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Saturday. He is one of the most iconic running backs of the last 20 years, a hard-hitting throwback with one of the game's great nicknames who ended his career in fairytale fashion with a championship in his hometown.
But really, when you look back at Bettis' career, the man they call "The Bus" probably never should have found a path to the NFL, much less to the podium he will soon stand on in Canton, Ohio.
Former Detroit Mackenzie star Jerome Bettis never imagined making the Pro Football Hall of Fame was possible as "a little fat kid from Detroit."
Dave Birkett, Detroit Free Press
While other kids were playing youth football and carrying their pads to practice, Bettis was competing in bowling tournaments with his family, carrying a briefcase to middle school, wearing thick-framed glasses and battling asthma.
Bettis rushed for 13,662 yards in 13 seasons for the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Los Angeles Rams. But he had almost no football pedigree and didn't play running back until his junior year at Detroit Mackenzie.
And when he made some poor choices in high school, if it weren't for the intervention of a coach, Bettis' career might have ended, along with his life.
But this what Bettis did have: Detroit and his family, an extremely strong work ethic and enough sense to rely on the good people around him.
Jerome Bettis on the sideline before the Steelers' wild card playoff game against the Ravens in Pittsburgh in January.
(Photo: AP)
"So I think growing up in Detroit you learn from all those life lessons that you're taught," Bettis told the Free Press in a phone interview. "It wasn't one thing in particular, but growing up in Detroit it really hardened me to the point where when I left and went to Notre Dame I was mentally tough, I was physically tough. And that came from all the lessons you learn and the mistakes that you make growing up. It makes you a better person, if you learn from them."
Bettis grew up on Detroit's west side in a stable middle-class family with his hard-working parents, Johnnie and Gladys, and two older siblings, Kimberly and John. He also grew up with the city's influences, good and bad, all around him. But his parents were the rocks. Johnnie, who died of a heart attack in 2006, was the chief of building and safety for Detroit and also taught electrical wiring at night school at Cass Tech.
"It was great to have two parents there because you get the nurturing from your mother and you get the sternness from your father," Bettis said. "With him there, he was my role model. He was a guy that I looked at and saw how you did things, how to be a man. I think there were a lot of benefits to having mom and dad in the household, and it felt normal."
The family's bond was evident.
"They were in the family together," said Bob Dozier, Bettis' coach at Mackenzie. "Most guys and girls don't have a father in the home or no parents; they stay with their grandmother or what have you; they're in a foster home. But he had two solid parents."
While Dozier had to take some of his players to McDonald's for a meal he knew they wouldn't get at home, the Bettises had plenty of food on the table. While Dozier watched heartbroken as some of his players were encouraged to sell drugs by their fathers, the Bettis family bowled twice a week at Central City Lanes on Woodward.
For Bettis, it’s important that he be known as the only Hall of Famer who was born, raised and played in Detroit.
(Photo: Amy Leang DfP)
"When he left that field, he had direction at home," Dozier said. "And another part of that was they were a family. They sat down and ate dinner together, which is a bygone tradition now."
Bettis' family life was a big advantage, but so was his keen mind. Before he knew what reading the field meant in football, he read the field of his future as a middle schooler at Detroit Urban Lutheran.
"And I realized that it was probably in my best interest to start thinking about how was I going to get to college," Bettis said. "With an older brother and an older sister, I realized it was going to be tough for my parents to send all of us to school. And I wanted to get some type of scholarship to go to school, so that led me thinking to football."
Leroy Bougard, the late football coach at Waterford Kettering, was Gladys' brother. Bougard saw that his nephew had size and raw talent and urged his sister to let her son play at a big school in the Public School League.
Bettis enrolled at Detroit Henry Ford and as a freshman he played linebacker. He was a good student and would eventually join the National Honor Society. But after his grades slipped his first semester, he transferred to Mackenzie — where Dozier was waiting with a plan that would form the basis of Bettis' career.
Mackenzie star Jerome Bettis
(Photo: Detroit Free Press)
"And I told him what we would do is, we're going to play you on the defensive line," Dozier said. "And I came up with this plan after I had watched him practice for a couple of days. And he was physical and tough as hell, so I put him at middle linebacker."
But Bettis was almost too physical. His sophomore year at Mackenzie, he played nose guard and tight end. He finally got the ball as a fullback his junior and senior years, when he also still played linebacker.
Naturally, Bettis' inclination was to hit. And keep hitting.
"I was just hitting people, pounding them," Bettis said. "I wasn't afraid of that contact. So I just enjoyed the pounding aspect of that position.
"And then I realized, 'Hey, you've got to make them miss and try to score touchdowns.' The physical nature came from linebacker and then naturally I just kind of learned how to play that position."
Dozier was a master teacher of the trap play, which opens a big hole for the running back and also served as the perfect metaphor for Detroit inner-city kids: People can help you find the right path that leads you from harm and toward success.
"And what Jerome would do, he'd get past some of those guys down the field and he'd turn into them and want to run guys over," Dozier said. "So it took me awhile to get that out of him: 'Jerome, don't turn back into the guys and try to punish them. Get your butt to the sideline and go to run a touchdown or get some yardage.' "
Of course. Don't look for trouble. It'll find you soon enough. And sure enough, trouble found Bettis in a way that is inexplicable to anyone who has not confronted the reality of day-to-day life for impressionable teenagers in Detroit.
Dozier said Bettis did "98% of the things right," but that small bad fraction could have been disastrous if Dozier had not stepped in.
In a highly publicized recent interview, Bettis said he sold drugs and shot at people as a way to make money. Dozier said when he went to Bettis' home and confronted him in front of his family, Bettis denied it.
Bettis signs autographs for fans in Summit Township, Pa., earlier this year.
(Photo: Sarah Crosby AP)
"So he waited a couple days and he went and told (his mother) that he lied," Dozier said. "He came and told me. When I left there, I had painted a picture of life and death to him."
Understandably, Bettis didn't want to rehash the episode a week before the highest honor of his life. But he did discuss learning from his mistakes and how growing up in Detroit made him better.
"So by the time I got to Notre Dame," he said, "I was developed mentally probably a little bit more than some of the other guys I had played college football with, just because growing up you see a lot more in Detroit than you maybe see growing up in suburban America."
Notre Dame led to the NFL and the NFL led to the Hall of Fame.
And now it can be up for debate, where Bettis stands among Michigan's five Hall of Famers. Barstools can begin burning over whether Bettis or Flint's Paul Krause, a Minnesota Vikings safety who played in four Super Bowls, is the best player from the state.
For Bettis, it's important that he be known as the only Hall of Famer who was born, raised and played in Detroit. And he is, because Hall of Fame offensive lineman Joe DeLamielleure was born in Detroit but played for Center Line St. Clement.
"There's been some great players that came from the state of Michigan," Bettis said. "So to be considered the best of them all, that would be an incredible honor, to say the least, and something that I look back early in my life and I would have never thought that would be the case, considering I never thought football was even a realistic goal for me."
Contact Carlos Monarrez: cmonarrez@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @cmonarrez. Download our free Lions Xtra app on your Apple and Android devices.
Jerome Bettis is now an analyst for ESPN.
(Photo: Colin Young-Wolff AP)
Meet Jerome Bettis
Who: Hall of Fame running back for the Rams and Steelers.
Born: Feb. 16, 1972 in Detroit.
Vitals: 5-11, 243 pounds.
High school: Detroit Mackenzie.
College: Notre Dame.
Drafted: 1st round by Rams in 1993 (No. 10 overall).
Honors: NFL offensive rookie of the year, 1993; six Pro Bowls; All-Pro, 1993, 1996; All-Pro second team, 1997.
By the numbers: Rushed for at least 1,000 yards in eight seasons, tied for third all-time when he retired. 13,662 yards was fifth all-time upon his retirement. Rushed for 91 touchdowns in 192 career NFL games.
The Hall call
What: Pro Football Hall of Fame induction ceremony.
When: 7 p.m. Saturday.
Where: Canton, Ohio.
TV: ESPN.
Who's in: Detroit Mackenzie RB Jerome Bettis, WR Tim Brown, LB/DE Charles Haley, LB Junior Seau, OL Will Shields, C Mick Tingelhoff and contributors Bill Polian and Ron Wolf.
Hall-of-Fame running back Jerome Bettis speaks to campers at the 2015 Sound Mind Sound Body camp. Video by Dave Birkett/DFP
Michigan men in the Hall
Jerome Bettis will become the fifth football player born in Michigan to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame next weekend. The list:
Bill Hewitt
An early star in the NFL, Hewitt was born in 1909 in Bay City and attended the University of Michigan. He was the first player to make the All-NFL team with two teams (the Bears and Eagles) and was known for inventing several trick plays in the early days of the league.
George Allen
Allen was born in Grosse Pointe Woods in 1918 and attended Alma College, Marquette University and the University of Michigan before going into coaching in 1948. He moved through the ranks quickly and took over the Rams in 1965. He went 118-54-5 and was 10th in NFL victories when he retired from the Redskins in 1977.
Paul Krause
Born in Flint in 1942, Krause left the state to attend the University of Iowa. Once he hit the NFL, he was an instant star, intercepting 12 passes in his rookie season and making the All-NFL team. He picked off 81 passes in total, retiring as the NFL's career leader and played in eight Pro Bowls with the Vikings and Redskins.
Joe DeLamielleure
Born in Detroit in 1951, DeLamielleure was a star at Center Line St. Clement and then Michigan State, making three All-Big Ten teams. He nearly missed out on the NFL because of an irregular heartbeat. Further testing cleared him to play and he became a star as part of the Bills' offensive line of the 1970s in front of O.J. Simpson.
Jerome Bettis
The Bus, born in 1972 in Detroit, started slow, not moving to running back at Mackenzie High until his junior season. From there, he starred at Notre Dame and then with the Rams and Steelers. He retired after winning Super Bowl XL in Detroit; his 13,662 rushing yards at retirement were fifth-most in league history.
Jerome Bettis’ high school football coach at Mackenzie, Bob Dozier, center, said Bettis’ tight-knit family was important to his success. “When he left that field, he had direction at home,” Dozier said.
(Photo: Free Press file photo)
Racking up the yards
Jerome Bettis retired at fifth place on the NFL's career rushing yards list, but has since dropped to sixth. The top 10:
1994-2005
Marshall Faulk: 12,279
1957-65
Jim Brown: 12,312
1977-88
Tony Dorsett: 12,739
1983-93
Eric Dickerson: 13,259
1993-2005
Jerome Bettis: 13,662
2001-11
LaDainian Tomlinson: 13,684
1995-2005
Curtis Martin: 14,101
1989-98
Barry Sanders: 15,269
1975-87
Walter Payton: 16,726
1990-2004
Emmitt Smith: 18,355
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